Monday, May 18, 2015

The Beauty of the In-Between


There are before pictures of renovated spaces. There are after pictures. There are people who document the process of renovation on TV. They always find something bad in the walls or ceiling that they didn't anticipate.

There's always a big reveal. It's like Cinderella, only it's a house.

This is my version of a renovation piece. It's the quiet part of the story.

This is not the big reveal. I will do my version of that some other time. At a later date I will show you my IKEA hack, my fetchingly arranged binders and my pretty bed. I might even show you the inside of my closets once they are finished. I will definitely photograph details of the placemats. Of that you can be sure.

I already posted The Beauty of The Before. You might want to have a look.

I keep thinking about the day I took these photographs. This is what it was like.

The painters had already finished their jobs. Some of the custom shelving was installed. I was waiting for the mattress and the carpet to be delivered. I was waiting for my nephew and his friend to come over and assemble IKEA. I was waiting for the guys to come and finish installing the shelves.

In an hour my apartment would be buzzing with activity. But for now, there was a monastery like silence punctuated by the sound of people walking. My apartment was so empty that I could hear every little thing in the building.

My apartment looked sort of like it did before and sort of like what it would eventually look like. In this state it also looked like neither of these things. Over the next days and weeks it would transition to being ours again.  But when I took these pictures, it was in a nether land.

Later that evening, when I was alone again, I called a friend to come over. I needed some company in there. I needed her presence to remind me that yes, this was indeed my apartment. I also wanted to show her our new things.

I sat on these pictures until I felt motivated to share them. At this point, I'm grateful I took some photographs. I think I would be starting to forget if I hadn't.

A beautiful mallet sits upon our unfinished shelves

This leftover rope caught the even morning light with calm elegance. I shot a close up of a closet hinge. The closet was painted White Wisp while the wall flanking it was transformed by Horizon. The near empty space highlighted the graceful lines of our art deco bannister.

The backside of a small shelving unit. These shelves have been in my husband’s family since his childhood. They are now enjoying a third act in our nephew’s apartment. We decided that we liked our floors the way they are. No re-finishing, no polyurethane.

Jeremy’s parents bought a lot of their furniture in the 1950’s. We took apart this gorgeous end table and stacked it out the way. It was one of the first items moved into place once our bed was set up.

Loads of cleaning going on in our dusty residence. Here is a detail of our flat rolling cart. It has proven indispensable for several moves.

Jeremy had to box up these liquor bottles during the paint job. They’re waiting for a good dusting before the transfer back to their swanky home.

You might also enjoy:

No comments:

Post a Comment